Slowly, James lifted his eyes to meet Cassian’s. Perplexed, he shook his head.
“How?”
Cassian shrugged. “I asked Maggie where he’d had it taken. Luckily, that photographer has a habit of keeping his negatives. I believe he keeps them for posterity’s sake rather than in case of inquiries like mine, but, regardless, that meant we lucked out all the same. He printed a new one for me.”
“I love it,” James said, his voice now noticeably wobbly. “I love it so much. Thank you.”
Just then, as Cassian knew would happen, James began to cry. Cassian plucked the envelope and photograph out of his hands and set them on the nightstand. Immediately thereafter, James collapsed into his arms.
“You’re too nice to me, I think,” James said with a sniffle as he buried his face in the crook of Cassian’s neck.
“Don’t say such ridiculous things,” Cassian said. “I’m precisely as nice as I ought to be to the man I love.” He kissed James’s head and threaded his fingers through his hair. “You’re an exceptional person, James. And it’s only right that I treat you as such.”
Cassian’s vision was starting to blur from the rush of emotion when James caught his mouth in a kiss. He (somewhat reluctantly) let a couple of tears fall while their lips moved together. Afterward, Cassian took James’s face in his hands and massaged his too-adorable cheeks with his thumbs.
“You aren’t uncomfortable with me having that in my wallet?” James asked.
“No, but I’d rather you keep it in a frame somewhere in our room, considering how much effort it took to find that for you,” Cassian said. “Do you like that idea?”
James pressed his lips together and nodded, like maybe he was attempting to hold back from crying some more. Cassian huffed a light laugh.
“I haveonemore thing for you, though,” Cassian said, sniffling and blinking back the rest of his unshed tears. “And I’m afraid that you are required to like it equally as much as you like the photograph of George.”
James crooked an eyebrow. Cassian stepped back and opened up one of the pieces of luggage. After only a couple seconds of rummaging, he found what he was looking for. Grinning proudly, he handed it to James who immediately bellowed a laugh.
“Good God, Cassian, is this what I think it is?”
“It’s a photograph of me,” Cassian confirmed with a nod. “I’d like for you to keepthisin your wallet.”
“You’re forcing me to keep a photograph of you in my wallet?” James asked through another roaring laugh.
“Why wouldn’t I?” Cassian scoffed. “It’s clearly something that you like to do.”
James, though, only continued to lose himself to how humorous he must have found this. Cassian let out a small huff and rolled his eyes. He really hadn’t thought that James would find his presentquitethis funny. Still, though, Cassian couldn’t help but smile a bit, even through the prickle of irritation.
Because at least his steward was happy.
After laughing a little more, James beamed at the wallet-sized photograph for a couple of long seconds and shook his head.
“I love it,” he finally said. “You look so ludicrously haughty in it, too.” He sniffled as he began to cry a bit more. “Oh, God, it’s perfect.”
Cassian huffed a laugh. Nowthatwas the reaction that he’d been hoping for. Taking James’s face in his hands, Cassian captured James’s mouth in another kiss.
Afterward, James smiled up at him in that wonderfully sweet way that made Cassian’s heart stutter.
“You’re incredible,” James said.
“I know,” Cassian replied warmly. “But so are you, James.”
He said this with complete and total certitude, in a manner that he might normally have reserved for relaying the irrefutable facts of how the world worked. But it was fitting right then as well. After all, Cassian knew for certain that what he’d said was true. James Thomas Morrow was anincredibleperson.
Because Cassian Penn Livingston wouldn’t have fallen for someone who was anything less.
Epilogue
James
April 14, 1918
